Rapidly quenched non-strained nanocrystalline Gd ribbons: Structural features and magnetic properties

Abstract Although magnetic refrigeration was a topic of special interest from fundamental point of view and applications for many years, recently special attention was paid for the development of low dimensional materials. In the present work, pure Gd ribbons were obtained by the melt-spun method in a conditions insuring very low stresses (velocity of the weal of 20–40 m/s). The structure, residual stresses and magnetocaloric effect obtained for 70 µm thick samples were comparatively analyzed. The residual stresses were carefully tested using X-ray diffraction techniques. The obtained results clearly reveal zero stress behavior for the investigated nanocrystalline ribbons. The magnetization was measured for temperature range 200–350 K (isotherms were measured with 5° steps) and in the magnetic field range of 0–7 T. The peak maximum was defined for the change of the magnetic entropy: the nanocrystalline rapidly quenched Gd ribbons had close value of the peak to that one known for bulk Gd.